Nothing Gold Can Stay
by ShadowBlazer
Summary: Liara realizes how easy the dearest things in life can be lost. ME3-based oneshot. Pre-EC. FemShep/Liara.


**Author's Notes**: Wow, two stories in less than three years. I'm doing better than my previous records.

Originally, this story came out of an exercise to show and not tell emotions, and from there, it spiraled out of control until it became something substantial on its own. The writing style itself is different from my natural one, but it seemed to fit here pretty well. This is another one-shot. I like doing them, because...well...long stories take a lot out of me. I'm working my way up.

I have made a small change since I first published this story. There is an additional line in the ending. I thought it added more to how I envisioned it. Anyone new to this story, ignore this. This is for people who have read it before.

**Disclaimer:** Bioware and EA officially own all the characters presented here. Robert Frost (or his relatives) owns the poem. I don't own anything but the story itself. _  
_

**Special Thanks: **To Awska and thedeadflag for taking time to read and give feedback on my earlier drafts of this story. Read some of their stories. They're good writers. Also, thanks to friends and family who gave me extensive commentary on how to improve. I believe that honest and constructive criticism is a writer's best friend, so if you see anything that needs reworking, just let me know. I want this story to be the best it can be. Finally, thanks to the readers here. It's not a story if there's not an audience :)**  
**

The following poem isn't necessary to the story. I just put it here, because it reflected the general themes of the story pretty well. Also, I just wanted an excuse to include Robert Frost. You can skip it if you're not up to reading poetry.

_Nature's first green is gold_  
_Her hardest hue to hold._  
_Her early leaf's a flower;_  
_But only so an hour._  
_Then leaf subsides to leaf._  
_So Eden sank to grief,_  
_So dawn goes down to day._  
_Nothing gold can stay._

-Robert Frost

* * *

Liara burns until Shepard finally lets go. They look at each other. The asari's lips still tingle. She cups the commander's face, and Shepard turns into the touch. She feels solid. She feels real. Liara kisses her again.

Ashley clears her throat impatiently while a bulky man beside her grins from ear to ear. Shepard shouts orders at him, and he takes the lift back down to the shuttle. Liara memorizes the feminine line of Shepard's jaw, the delicate slope of her nose, the unreadable expression in those distant eyes. Shepard looks indomitable. Liara sees the woman she met on Therum.

They follow her path to the core of the Mars Archive. Shepard leads as always. She pauses before the path outside and looks back at Liara. The door opens, and she steps out.

Liara follows.

* * *

The council refuses to listen.

Shepard fumes about why they even bother. She paces around Liara's cabin. Palaven is only hours away.

The asari points out her various workstations in an attempt to calm the soldier. Shepard pays obligatory attention to the loads of screens and computer hardware around them. A smile flickers across the commander's face when Liara swats at Glyph hovering near her head.

Liara takes note of the probability her workstation simulation offers of surviving the Reaper invasion with current resources. She turns the screen off.

Shepard is gazing out the windows, her eyes wide, her mouth open. The asari wonders what the commander sees when she looks out into space. Both of Shepard's hands slowly come to the back of her neck then drop away. She turns to Liara, asks her what their chances are. Liara ignores the answer her program gave; she wonders what will become of them if something happens. She asks about Thane.

Liara knows that Shepard and he got close when they were fighting the Collectors. Shepard says he had been there for her when she needed him. She stands across the room. She stays there. The look the commander casts is almost accusing.

Liara thinks about all the videos she'd seen with Shepard and Thane, the glances, the touches, the embraces. A question rises in her throat. From the way Shepard looks at him, the answer is obvious. She can't get it out. It suffocates her.

Shepard takes a step towards her. Liara asks if she wants to be with him. It's not what she wants to know.

Shepard holds her hands and looks her in the eyes. Her grip is firm but not constricting. Her face is open and sincere. She says she would choose a future with Liara over a future with Thane. She says she doesn't know if she wants to spend the rest of her life with anyone else.

Liara's heartbeats hammer in her ears. She wants to point out you can't change your feelings for someone that quickly. The look in Shepard's eyes stops her. The commander tugs her forward, and Liara melts into her. She's distracted by Shepard's lips, hands, and hips. It feels like years since they've last been together.

The back of Liara's knees bang against her bed. The commander inhales sharply. Liara pulls her down. Shepard doesn't resist.

* * *

Garrus looks beat up but alive when they bring him aboard the Normandy. He goes to the med bay for a check-up with Dr. Chakwas. Shepard is staring at her helmet in her hands. She heard hissing from when casing got cracked on Palaven.

Liara soothes her with comforting words. Shepard doesn't see her. Her gaze is on something beyond the slender scientist. The asari wonders what she is thinking about. Shepard's face is bloodless and still. Her breathing is harsh and labored. She is harder to read than Liara remembers. Liara wants to ask about Thane again. She steps in front of her.

Shepard is shaking, and Liara is startled by the commander's trembling. She asks the soldier what's wrong. Shepard's eyes are panicked and frightened like an animal's. Her breathing is shot; the commander clutches at the back of her neck, scrabbling, nails drawing blood as Shepard relives an experience that Liara can't see. Liara throws the commander's hands away, pulls her close, pleads with the panicked soldier to see her.

Shepard jerks away. She slams into the side of the hull and quivers.

Her breathing starts to even out. The commander steadies herself, and her eyes open, infernos breaking into light. Liara finds herself breathless at Shepard's expression. So much anger and terror. So different than when she had first met the commander.

Shepard grimaces. She slides past the asari to head to her room.

Liara touches her wrist, and Shepard snaps away.

The asari thinks she sees shame flash across Shepard's face. Shepard turns her down. She says she has a headache.

Liara watches her walk away.

* * *

There's an email from a Tannor Nuara who wants to meet Shepard at Huerta Memorial. It catches the scientist's attention, but Shepard told her it's just Thane. Liara is not reassured. When she asks for detail on the matter, Shepard slips away. Liara wonders if he is going to make Shepard's life more difficult.

Everyone does in one way or another.

* * *

Fingers stab into the keyboard. The confrontation was over before Shepard speaks. Liara pushes the play button and the video images are clear on all of her monitors. Shepard and Thane embrace on the screen. Thane whispers into her ear. Shepard conspires back. They share a kiss. They leave for privacy.

The commander slinks out of the room. She doesn't look at Liara.

The asari prefers that just fine.

* * *

The commander makes her speak with her father. It becomes very awkward when Aethyta mentions the soldier and bed in the same sentence. With a flat tone, Liara asserts that those days are behind them. When the matriarch prompts for an explanation, Liara gives a terse summary.

Aethyta listens to what Liara says. She watches her daughter's gestures, the minute shifts in her expressions. She listens to the inflection in Liara's tone as she insists she has better things to worry about than the commander's affairs. The bartender's face looks troubled.

Her father suggests that maybe Liara should try reconnecting with the soldier. Liara stares at her. She asks if Aethyta heard what she said. She doesn't need the commander. She is just fine. Her father responds that she understood more than that.

Liara shakes her head. She knows too well now what her worth is to the commander. Aethyta comments that a woman like Shepard won't stick around forever. Liara thinks of Thane. She agrees. The bitterness almost chokes her.

Aethyta frowns at her daughter's expression. She recommends that Liara makes sure that she wants to leave her for good. Some paths can't be changed once chosen. Benezia had always been aware of that. Liara counters if her mother was aware when she left Liara in her childhood for years at a time. Aethyta says it was for the good of Thessia. Liara says she would prefer a live mother to a dead diplomat. Aethyta doesn't have an answer to that.

Liara turns to go. Aethyta asks if she will drop by again. The younger asari doesn't know. She had learned from the commander not to make obligations she can't keep. She thinks about Hagalaz before the commander flew into the Omega-4 relay. She recalls asking Shepard to come back to her. The commander shook her head with the saddest smile Liara had ever seen. She said she can't.

Liara passes the soldier sitting at the edge of the courtyard. Her table is piled with data pads and reports. She glances up when Liara walks by, but the asari brushes past.

Liara is halfway up the courtyard's stairs when she looks back. The commander is leaning forward, gazing out into the wards. Her eyes are disconnected and dimmed. In the Presidium's golden light, Shepard almost looks like a young goddess, an illusive dreamlike vision that flickers into the fragile tangibility of reality then dies away.

The young asari thinks over Aethyta's words and becomes troubled.

* * *

It's hard to find Shepard on the Normandy. The woman constantly moves from station to station. Liara would ask EDI, but the AI has somehow learned to respect Shepard's privacy. This time, the asari discovers the commander under the engineering deck.

Whatever reports Liara brought are forgotten as she watches the commander drift off. Shepard's eyes almost look bruised. Liara wonders what she dreams about. It cannot be pleasant if she is so desperate to avoid it.

Liara should wake Shepard. She sits down beside her instead. The commander mumbles in her sleep. Liara can't catch the exact words, but she hears something about Earth, something about a boy. She squeezes the commander's hand without realizing she reached for it. Shepard squeezes back. Her grip is crushing.

Shepard wakes up at Liara's yelp. The asari cradles her hand to her chest. When the commander looks, Liara queries about what Shepard sees when she closes her eyes.

Shepard doesn't answer. She asks what Liara would do when Shepard dies. The scientist demands to know what she meant by that, but the commander doesn't meet her eyes. Liara thinks of her father's words then brushes them away.

Shepard inquires if Liara ever worries about her home-world. The asari does all the time, but Shepard's mission always comes first. If they succeed, everything will be saved. Thessia will be saved.

Shepard gazes at her hands. Liara has never seen her look so helpless before.

Liara doesn't like Shepard's expression. She tries to tease the commander. She asks if there's any more apologies to come. She lifts up her throbbing hand as a reminder.

Shepard stares straight ahead. Her eyes are red.

She says Liara has had enough.

* * *

Liara had only seen that look on Shepard's face one time before.

Virmire had been a lifetime ago.

Thane slumps against the door frame, large eyes blinking rapidly. Even now his dark coat is draped elegantly on the ground. The blood slides down in gentle streams.

Shepard looks at the injured drell then barks orders to Commander Bailey. Her eyes burn wildly. Liara presses a medi-gel pad into Thane's wound as the commander jumps into an opened vehicle. After what he did for them, what he tried to do, Liara can not leave him without trying to help. She looks into his eyes and thinks about the question she couldn't ask Shepard.

A green hand snaps onto hers. He looks at the asari and pulls her closer. His lips open. His eyes flicker between her and the commander. Thane whispers to her. Liara reels back. He answers her question. She doesn't think he knows about it.

Shepard bellows, and Liara cannot delay any longer with Kai Leng escaping. Liara runs to the car, and they shoot off so fast that she is slammed into her seat.

She notices Thane's blood is on her hands. She wipes it off.

* * *

The geth dreadnought is a disaster. Shepard, Tali and Commander Williams nearly got added to the memorial wall. Liara doesn't have much sympathy for the quarian admiral Shepard tossed off-board.

Shepard stands in front of the memorial. To Liara's surprise, she's not looking at Thane's newly added name but at the top where the crew of the first Normandy lie. Liara steps beside Shepard. She pulls the commander's fingers away from Pressley's name. He had been a good man.

Shepard says she should be up there. She's sick of losing friends. She glances at Liara. She's sick of losing more. She touches Thane's name. Her eyes are distant. Liara hates how they remind her of dying suns. She asks her again what she dreams about. Shepard looks at her for a long, slow moment. She answers Thane.

The corridor they are in suddenly feels tight and airless. They stand shoulder to shoulder, but the distance between them is like that of two stars. Liara is about to leave when Shepard continues.

She sees Thane in her dreams. She sees Mordin. She sees Kaiden. She watches the blow-out of 300,000 lives destroyed in the wake of her decision, she mourns the people on Earth she had left behind. She chases a little boy who died while she got away. She sees the Reapers consuming the galaxy because nothing she did changed its fate.

Liara doesn't know how to describe what she feels. She covers Shepard's hand with her own. She asks why Shepard never told her. The commander didn't have to bear it by herself. She has people who care about her. She has people who love her. Shepard turns to her. Liara doesn't look away.

Liara can tell Shepard understood her. She doesn't respond to it. Liara thinks she doesn't know how to. Shepard tries to withdraw, but Liara tightens her grip on the commander's hand. Liara says she understands. Shepard shakes her head. She doesn't think so. She never wants her to really feel what Shepard does. Liara responds it doesn't change her stance on the matter.

Shepard is silent. She looks at the board. She says she doesn't want to add any more names. She would die so no one else has to. Liara squeezes her hand. She says she knows Shepard will ensure that no more will. Liara will help whenever the commander needs it. All she asks of her is for Shepard to let Liara be at her side.

Shepard flicks her eyes from their joined hands to the woman beside her.

Liara thinks she's going to pull away. Shepard lets out a thank you instead. She looks at the memorial board. They stay like that without exchanging another word.

Liara thinks about her father.

Aethyta had vanished by the time Liara searched for her after Cerberus' attack. The scorch marks near the vending machine and the owner's despair at losing one of his workers tell a story she understands too well. She no longer spends her shore leave there.

Liara realizes what Aethyta had really been trying to say to her. Shepard had understood it all along. People like her father, like Thane, don't stay around forever.

They can't.

* * *

Thessia falls. Five billion lives are extinguished in a single day.

Liara collapses against her console, the sudden realization of how much the Reapers have taken away crippling her inside and out.

Gentle fingers lift her hands off her keyboard where Liara is trying to arrange transportation for refugees. Shepard cradles her against her chest, bringing her to her bed. Liara weeps openly against Shepard's neck. The commander strokes her crest. She whispers words of comfort to the crushed woman. They're not enough.

Liara pulls Shepard down when they reach the bed. She needs her. Shepard doesn't resist and lets Liara take as much of her as she wants.

When Liara wakes, the commander is sitting near the curtains. Liara's desk lamp throws odd shadows on Shepard's face. Shepard is deathly still. She doesn't blink for a long time.

Shepard doesn't notice when Liara calls her from the bed. Bloodshot eyes look like they're chasing a dream no one else can see. She has said goodbye to another friend on Rannoch. She has seen Thessia collapse today.

Liara slaps her. The commander looks up in surprise and sees her trembling. She takes the distressed woman into her arms.

Liara asks Shepard does it. How does she go on when everything she holds dear keeps getting torn away? Shepard gazes at her. She says even if she loses more, she will continue to fight. She always reminds herself what there still is left.**  
**

Liara inquires what does Shepard still have? Shepard just pulls her closer. Liara closes her eyes and turns into the commander. She doesn't ask her any more questions.

* * *

Shepard acknowledges her first.

Liara stands in the captain's quarters, watching the commander examine her helmet. The Cerberus station looms in everyone's minds.

Shepard puts aside her helmet. She stands up, and Liara goes to her. The asari gently tugs Shepard towards her. The commander takes a sharp breath but doesn't resist. Liara cups Shepard's face. The commander closes her eyes and turns into the touch.

They stand like that for what seems like an eternity, what seems like a second. Shepard opens her eyes. There's a deep furrow between her eyebrows. Liara wonders what her thoughts are when Shepard gives voice to them.

What if everything's not enough? What if, despite all the friends they've lost, the promises made, the futures gained, the worlds lost, that it had been for naught? What if nothing they did could change how it all ends?

Liara strokes the side of Shepard's face. She tells her that Shepard will make everything change, and that Liara will be beside her every step to ensure she does. Even if it kills the both of them, she will make sure that Shepard does what she is born to do. She promises that if only Shepard will let her.

Shepard glances at Liara almost shyly. She asks if she still have people who love her. Liara affirms the answer in less than a heartbeat. She steps towards the commander, who pulls her into her arms. Liara doesn't need to hear Shepard's response. She already knows the words.

For now, Shepard is hers.

For now, it's all that matters.

* * *

Liara wakes up, and her skin is on fire. Bodies lay in charred pieces around her. Ships flare through the armada of Reapers in the frantic sky. Vehicles are tossed upside down, their wheels spinning garishly like a sordid carnival act.

Operation Hammer has failed.

She pushes herself upright. She stumbles. Liara heaves up blood. Something is broken inside. Garrus is lying beside her. He doesn't get up.

She staggers, sees Shepard limp her way to a solid tower of light. Liara calls for her.

Liara thinks the commander can't hear her when Shepard suddenly looks back. Liara stumbles towards her. Shepard takes her hand, and Liara doesn't let go. They look at each other. They don't say a word. Shepard steps into the light.

And Liara follows.

* * *

**Author's End Notes**: Would you believe this story took me a month to write? Most of the difficulty laid in the terseness of the story of itself. The style itself is new and experimental for me and took many, many rewrites to ensure it stayed consistent throughout. Looking at the word count itself, I've actually sheered off close to 1,500 words. I'm overwhelmed at how packed everything is.

I had romanced Thane and Liara, resulting in accidentally cheating on the latter. (It was really a case of random button mashing and horrible curiosity as to the consequences, but I digress). The game does not, in any way, permit you to break up with Thane. There are no options that prompt a "Let's just be friends" dialogue, and he always refers to you as the last of his loves. Given what happens to him, it isn't really that much of a block to another romance, but it does break the game immersion a bit. Also, Liara still takes you back even if you cheated with Thane. Part of this one-shot was to provide a possible reason for why she does.

Anyways, thanks for reading. I'm planning to move onto longer works (8+ chapters as of planning), so catch me there if you would like to get more of my writing.

Cheers.


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